A retired high school teacher with a goitre-like mass on her neck was found to have a rare case of primary thyroid TB that had been overlooked for years, report doctors in Ethiopia.

The 60-year-old woman presented to a teaching hospital in the northern city of Gondar with anterior neck swelling.

While the mass had been present for six years — during which she had sought medical advice but without resolution — it had grown further in the past three months.

She had no significant past medical history and no cough but reported a low-grade intermittent fever, unquantified weight loss and night sweating, the doctors wrote in the Journal of Medical Case Reports.